A new bill will allow a person to be tried and convicted of a criminal offence without seeing all the information relied on by the Crown and without the right to be present, the NZ Law Society says.

International firm cuts 45 lawyers’ jobs as landscape changes

Reed Smith has cut 45 jobs from its offices in the US, Europe and the Middle East as it makes changes following a strategic review of its operations. The firm says that the legal services landscape has changed in both demand and delivery terms. The firm has reduced its global headcount in both legal and non-legal roles by 2.5 per cent although its offices in Asia have not been affected by the latest round of redundancies.

New principal for global law firm
Baker & McKenzie Wong & Leow in Singapore has appointed Pallavi Gopinath Aney as principal of its debt capital markets group. She joins from Magic Circle firm Linklater’s Singapore office and has advised extensively on capital markets transactions involving India, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and The Philippines.

KWM’s European leader to step down
The European managing partner of King & Wood Mallesons has resigned after less than a year in the role. William Boss will step down in April to concentrate on his real estate practice which includes some high-profile clients. Partner elections will take place shortly. Boss took up the management role in 2015 after the six-year tenure of Rob Day.

South Korea criticised for restricting foreign law firms
Delegates from Australia, Britain and the US have urged South Korea to rethink their restrictions on foreign law firms. Despite trade agreements that aim to open up professional services in the country, FT.com reports that a bill being proposed by Korea would mean foreign law firms could only practice certain areas of domestic law in the country and only when doing so as part of a joint venture which is majority-owned by the Korean partner. “I'm not sure whether it's liberalisation or actually handcuffing foreign firms,” William Kim, Korea head for Ropes & Gray told the Financial Times.